Thursday, June 09, 2005

Cheesy Pasta

Now, we've tried countless baked, multi-cheese pasta dishes in the past. And I usually have the same problems with them: cheeses don't blend, too heavy, etc.

But not this one. Slater's baked pasta was perfect.

I'm not idly throwing superlatives around here. This was truly the best baked cheese pasta I've tasted.

Cook tube pasta, about nine minutes (actually a little more 'done' than I care for, but I went with the flow). Drain lightly, return pasta to pan, and melt a little over a half stick (!) of butter, tossing the pasta till shiny. To this, add almost-equal amounts of Gruyere, Fontina, Gorgonzola and Parmesan; add some salt and pepper, and a bit of cream. Stir it all up, and dump into a shallow baking dish (rather unceremoniously, in my case). Bake until cheese melts.

It may not look like much here (pale pasta and pale cheese; what chance does it have? Demille would struggle to make it look good), but my goodness; what a dish!

The Gruyere and Gorgonzola were the most prominent flavors, not surprisingly. And while it was very filling (I put about a third of mine back), it was not heavy.

As Matt put it: "This doesn't suck."

Only four or five more meals to work through, then it's on to Monastery Salads!

5 Thoughts for food:

Sounds delicious. Once you throw gorgonzola into something, we're so there! I'm going to have to dig out my copy of Nigel's Real Food and start cooking from it. Barefoot Contessa also has a great 5-cheese baked pasta dish.

It's a really good dish, Stephanie. And I know what you mean; Alex only wants to eat Annie's mac and cheese. He completely turns his nose up at any other kind. At least I can take heart in knowing it's organic...